East Jordan native wins offroad triathlon national title

That wasn't before the top-ranked American male in the Xterra U.S. Professional Off-road Triathlon Series finally achieved something he has been attempting to do for nearly a decade.

Middaugh, a 1996 East Jordan High School graduate who now resides in Eagle-Vail, Colo., earned a long-awaited victory Saturday at the Xterra USA Championship at Snowbasin Resort in Ogden, Utah.

Middaugh, 34, had never placed higher than third at the USA Championships. He posted a winning time of 2 hours, 26 minutes, 34 seconds in the event, which comprised a 1.5k swim, a 28k mountain bike ride, and a 10k run.

An accomplished runner whose career began in 2000, Middaugh has won the Xterra East Championship, Xterra West Championship and the Xterra Mountain Championships -- three of the five major events on the professional tour -- but the USA Championship had always eluded him, until Saturday.

"Relief and validation I guess," Middaugh said. "It's a dream come true to finish that good. I felt my fitness and my training was where I thought it was and it felt really good. It still feels good."

Middaugh, who was his class salutatorian at East Jordan and an All-Stater in both cross country and track, finished nearly two minutes ahead of runner-up Ben Allen of Australia (2:28:46). Nico Lebrun of France, the defending champion, was third in 2:29:02.

"It was a little unique in that I went 10 weeks leading up to the race without racing a triathlon," Middaugh said. "That's not normal at all, but I was training for a long race."

Middaugh employed a revamped training regiment for this, his 10th try at the USA Championship. He drew on former coaches and used his own background -- he holds a master's degree in physiology and is a personal trainer -- in developing his regiment.

"I put together a really solid training program, which was a long process," Middaugh said. "It finally paid off."

Known as one of the fastest runners on the Xterra circuit, Middaugh took the lead midway through the mountain bike course and stretched his lead during the run.

"Normally my strength is on the bike and run," Middaugh said. "My weakness has been swimming, but swimming finally paid off. I wasn't with the leaders in the water, I was about two minutes behind the leader (Allen), and a minute behind the main competitors."

On the bike, Middaugh caught and passed Allen a few kilometers before the midway point.

He never relinquished it, and was about 80 seconds ahead when he made the trasition from biking to running.

"Once I had the lead, I knew I could win," Middaugh said. "But I also got pretty nervous about getting a flat tire. Last year I had a flat so I was being pretty conservative on the downhill and felt good on climbs."

Middaugh's lead on the run was large enough at the end that grabbed two of his children and carried them across the finish line.

"I've been racing professionally since 2003 and that was my 10th time there," Middaugh said. "I've had a lot of cracks at it. It's been a long road and it finally came through on the right day."

Middaugh, whose collegiate running career at Central Michigan was cut short by injury, said the course setup with plenty of elevation suited him perfectly.

"I live just outside of Vail and train where there's plenty of elevation so the course really worked to my advantage," he said.

Middaugh entered the race with a full beard as part of a strategy months ago to stop shaving until he won a race. He shaved immediately following the race, and doesn't believe he'll grow it back -- or have the time -- before he competes in the Xterra World Championship at Kapalua, Maui, on Oct. 28.

"I have a really good shot at it," Middaugh said of the World Championships. "With seeing the competition I saw last weekend, it's the best in the world, but the field will be much deeper (in Hawaii). There'll be more Europeans who I haven't seen all year, but I did get to race against Lebrun, who's beating most of the Europeans over there."

Middaugh is married to his college sweetheart, Ingrid, and has three children, Sullivan, 8; Porter, 6; and Larsen, 2. He said the best part about the entire event was that his father, Steve, saw it in person.

"We picked up my dad from the airport on the way out (to Utah)," Middaugh told the Vail (Colo.) Daily. "He doesn't get to see as many races as he'd like, maybe one every year or two. It was good to have him here. ... He picked a good one."